The Biomedical Revolution is Here
March 12, 2025
... and it’s coming to developmental healthcare
The EKO Spring Symposium 2025 closing keynote focuses on precision developmental health—the personalization of clinical care.
“We’re closing our conference with the leaders of Canada’s premier child research institutes addressing one of the most exciting advances on the healthcare horizon,” says EKO President & CEO Jennifer Churchill. “We’re talking about an approach that is personalized, preventative, predictive, and participatory.”
“We are all similar, and we’re also all different,” says Dr. Evdokia Anagnostou, Vice President of Research and Director of the Bloorview Research Institute, and Child Neurologist at Holland Bloorview Kids Rehabilitation Hospital. “Data and data science are improving our understanding of disability and neurodivergence in ways that weren’t possible 10 years ago, and that enables us to reimagine developmental healthcare. We have a fantastic opportunity to move away from traditional medicine’s ‘one size fits all’ approach and focus on the individual—tailoring clinical treatment for each child with a disability or developmental need.”
Precision healthcare aims to personalize treatment strategies based on individual biological differences and social determinants. While the approach has proven successful for certain healthcare needs, broader translation—particularly in child health—faces some challenges that are compounded as existing methods fail to incorporate the physiology and socio-biology unique to childhood.
“Still, precision healthcare in pediatrics has shown encouraging results in oncology, guiding the selection of targeted therapies and improving outcomes. Precision health is also expanding into pediatric areas like neurology, where genetic insights into autism spectrum disorders and epilepsy are facilitating personalized therapeutic strategies,” says Dr. Stephen Scherer, chief of research & Northbridge Chair in Paediatric Research at The Hospital for Sick Children and University of Toronto, and director of the U of T McLaughlin Centre. “Our goal is to understand each child’s health and development, so we can predict better, treat smarter and provide clinical care faster.”
Register for the EKO Spring Symposium 2025 and join us to learn more from Dr. Evdokia Anagnostou and Dr. Stephen Scherer